Every Moment is a Choice
by twriter12
Summary: This is a collection of one-shots focused on Sasha.
1. Chapter 1

The sky was a perfect shade of blue filled with clouds so white they look bathed in Clorox. There was a slight breeze and if Sasha forgot the world she could imagine herself on a boat in the St. John's River back home. Her eyes closed and she even saw herself in her favorite turquoise bikini. But her eyes needed to be open because she wasn't on the river and it wasn't the past.

She was standing watch with her weapon secure in her hands. Up here, she felt her safest. She felt most at home. She didn't trust anyone to be up here more than she trusted herself. Not Rick. Not Michonne. Not Abraham. Not Daryl. The new world couldn't erase her father's teachings. If you want something done right, do it yourself. She wasn't good at delegating. Especially when her butt was on the line. Trust was something she didn't give easy.

It took time to open up to anyone in the group after Bob and Tyreese died. She felt like she was in a black hole and she couldn't escape it's hold on her. The despair was like nothing she had ever experienced and it hurt so much she wasn't sure she wanted to live long enough to try. That was painful. There was a time when she never gave up because her father didn't tolerate a quitter. So she retreated to her own thoughts and feelings. It was a loneliness she never felt that only deepened when they arrived in Alexandria. She was already disconnected from the group and they all seemed to start making connections with the Alexandrians.

She heard Rick's voice as he greeted Eugene down below. Just the sound of his voice made people stand a little straighter. Even her. He was a force to be reckoned with and, flaws and all, she respected him greatly. When she looked down he was climbing up to join her.

"How does it look?"

"Nice and boring. Just how I like it." Ever since Carol slipped out on her watch Sasha was driven to prove why she was one of the best watchmen. No one blamed her, at least not to her face, but she was embarrassed.

He chuckled. "Yeah. Me too." He hooked his thumbs in his jean loops and stared out beyond the gates, scanning the area immediately outside the gate from left to right and back again until he was looking at her.

"Is something wrong? Someone spot something?" She put the scope of her rifle to her eye and surveyed the area.

"Abraham really loves you. You should forgive yourself and be completely happy."

She dropped the weapon back down to her waist. Hearing Abraham's name brought out a range of emotions all which made her want to throw up. She was prepared to talk about shifts, security, changes, pretty much anything but a connection of humanity. It wasn't the relationship she and Rick had. There was mutual respect, there just wasn't any intimacy. They never had a reason to stay away from each other. More than anything, they just never had a reason to talk to each other in this way. Did she want to have this conversation with him? She felt so isolated since she made the choice to let Abraham in her life. Even within the family she felt like others wouldn't see her side, couldn't see her side. Rosita was the sympathetic figure in this small-world messy triangle.

"Love is a strong word." Abraham had yet to say that word to her but his behavior led her to believe it was possible. He wasn't shy with his affection and the future, a future with her, was one of his favorite subjects, even going so far as to discuss children.

"You don't love him?"

"Rosita. She loves him." She knew that. How her friend felt and she still allowed herself to fall for Abraham. She ruined an established relationship for a maybe, a possibility. She wasn't ready to say love but she was open to what may come. That's all she could promise him and he seemed to accept it. His affection for her seemed to be so pure and sweet. That was intoxicating. She felt the stirring she felt when Bob made her smile, made her see there was life to live.

"Abraham can't stay with Rosita just to keep from hurting her. If you two being together makes you happy," Rick shrugged, "you should be together."

"I'll just tell her that. I'm sure it'll go over well and all will be forgiven." The looks Rosita tossed her way since Sasha and Abraham became a couple were hard to take.

"Her pain doesn't make you the bad guy. It's a crappy situation, Sasha."

"I heard about your wife and your best friend. If your wife had decided to be with him, would you have been able to handle that? Being around them?"

"That's different."

She didn't think so but it was his story and maybe she was missing some details. "Really? How so?"

"Because she did choose. She chose me. He's the one who couldn't handle it. And we had a son."

"And it nearly destroyed your group." She shrugged. "It's not different Rick." She felt closed off from the group because of how they would react even though no one ever said anything or treated her different. Maybe it was self-punishment. It wasn't best for a small group in a closed off environment that needed to be able to trust each other.

"Rosita may not like it. I don't know if she's accepted it but I do I know she's not causing problems. Let me ask you this. If Abraham goes back to Rosita, you'll be okay? It's forever changed now. There is no way to take this back to how it was. We can only deal with it best we can for the good of everyone. That's something Shane didn't do. He wasn't capable of the higher road. He couldn't put his pride aside and accept that what he felt for my wife wasn't real. And what Abraham and Rosita had, that wasn't real."

She frowned. "How do you know that?" She had more specific questions than that. She was ready to bombard him with a slew of his questions but wanted to remain clam. Did Abraham tell him he didn't love Rosita? Did he speak about her to Rick?

"Because he's at a point where he's able to choose and that's what he did. He chose you just like you chose him out of everyone else. That means something. When you choose who you want to be with instead remaining where you were because it doesn't matter...that's living. To make choices is to live."

"You make it sound so clean and easy, but it's not Rick."

He placed his hand on her shoulder. "Sasha, I've gotten to know you. You're not malicious. That you're sitting here struggling with this tells me so."

"She'll never forgive me." She turned to him. "Can you blame her?"

She held her breath as she watched him seem to search for words. Not until he inhaled deeply did she take a breath. She wanted desperately for Rick to say something to make her relationship with Abraham okay. His blessing would go a long way.

"When the pain and embarrassment leaves and she realizes it's better to not be with someone who doesn't love her, she'll be able to get past this. You two never meant to hurt her."

She appreciated his desire to assuage her guilt. But instead of searching for encouragement from Rick, Abraham, and Maggie she should ask for forgiveness from Rosita. It was so hard. She just wasn't sure if she could do it. What if Rosita rejected her? It was easier to not know for sure and hold out the possibility of Rosita being okay rather than knowing for sure that she was hated.

She faced Rick. "My dad used to say there was intent versus impact. Because you didn't intend to cause someone pain doesn't mean you're not responsible for the impact of your actions."

"I can respect that. Your father sounds like a good man."

"He was." Her chin lifted slightly and her shoulders back. Her father's strength and honor would have been a key asset in this world.

"Forever. We used to take forever for granted. We gave our forevers to whoever was in front of us. But now, _now_? Forever is different. Forever means something. If he's worth your forever then you can't let that pass you by."

She looked at him with that wide-eyed slightly maniacal look of disbelief Rick always brought out in people. "Rick." She let loose a short laugh. She shook her head at him. "She never had a chance."

"She who?" He frowned.

"You know who. You look at her like she's the stars, the sun, and the moon. And she does the same. You did it before we got here. Maybe it wasn't romance, but it was intense. It was love. Even then. When you two disagreed in that barn," she said with a shake of her head. "It was like two planets colliding. That's what I want."

He smiled. "I think you can have that. If you allow yourself." He patted her shoulder again. "I'll see you around."

She watched him climb down realizing his only reason for showing up was to try and put her at ease. They had things in common, like thinking Alexandria wasn't a return to normal life but an avoidance of the harsh reality. Sadly, their commonalities were the very things that kept each of them from connecting emotionally with most people, including each other.

"Hey, Rick."

He looked up.

"Thanks."

He smiled and walked off.

She smiled and turned her attention back to guarding the community. Maybe he wasn't aware of what he just did, but that moment meant a lot to her. Clarity. That's what it gave her and these days that was everything.


	2. Burns My Biscuits

"I'm so over this." Olivia threw a can of beans on the shelf causing quite the noise and bringing everything and everyone to a halt. She had just been outside with Rosita, Sasha could only assume that conversation didn't go well. Rosita had a way about her. She was nice and she would save your life but she could rub people the wrong way. It was misunderstandings and passion more than a bad attitude. Sasha knew from experience. People often thought the worst of her.

Sasha and Tara threw a glance at each other unsure of what was going on. This outburst was out of character for Olivia. She was calm and a bit passive. Only fear seemed to elicit a change in emotion in her. She and Tara were heading out on a run with Abraham soon and stopped by to ask Olivia if there was anything the community needed.

Francine walked over to Olivia. "What's wrong?"

"After everything we've been through, it's still them," She looked at Sasha and Tara. "And then there's us. The Wolves, the herd, the Saviors. We're still standing but they still don't trust us. It," she stopped and let out a strangled growl. "It really burns my biscuits."

If it weren't such a serious moment Sasha would have laughed at that saying. She never heard that before. Burns my biscuits. She liked it.

"We're all in this together," Sasha assured her.

"Yeah, we're all in it together but there are differences," Olivia said. She cleaned the mess she made, organizing the cans on the shelf. "But we all know there are rings to this circle. We're the outer ring and you're the inner circle." She turned around faced Sasha and Tara as if daring them to disagree.

It didn't go unnoticed to any of them that even their position in the garage was an unintentional example of what Olivia was saying. She and Francine were on one side while Sasha and Tara were on the other side.

"Olivia, we're trying," Sasha spoke gently. "Even before the world was hell on Earth some people had closer bonds than others. We were out there. Out there struggling to survive and had each other's backs in a way I can't explain.

"But you're in here now and we've been through a lot as well." Francine had always been somewhat bitter of their addition to the community.

Sasha had the feeling some of the people in Alexandria who felt they were the strongest and bravest in the eyes of the other citizens resented the group's arrival because it showcased just how much they didn't know. It was as if people like Heath and Francine weren't the biggest and baddest dogs on the block anymore. That seemed to make them a bit insecure.

That was never the intention but when Rick, Abraham, Daryl, and the rest of them took positions of power and leadership it was because they knew what they were doing not because they wanted to be in control. It wasn't a takeover. It was Deanna's decision to put them in their jobs.

"Of course you've been through a lot," Tara spoke up. "But we can't pretend we haven't been through more and know what's out there." Tara was forever the mediator.

Sasha understood they didn't know what this group had seen. "We watched Maggie's dad killed right before our eyes with a sword to the neck by a man who wanted the home we created for ourselves. We watched as Daryl carried Maggie's sister's dead body out of a hospital. We watched my boyfriend tell us how cannibals chopped off his leg and ate it in front of him. Rick and Carl were reunited with Judith after they thought she was dead. She was cared for by my brother, who I thought was dead and who died shortly after I reunited with him. Glenn and Maggie were separated and without a phone or an idea, found each other on nothing but faith and love. Abraham, Tara, Eugene, Rosita, and I helped them find each other. And we're here because we left Georgia to get Noah home to his family in Richmond."

She never shared what they been through. She didn't know what the others had shared and who they shared it with. Aaron probably knew some things because of his connection with Maggie and his recruiting work with Daryl. Maybe Spencer knew some things because of the bond he seemed to have with Michonne. What she just told Olivia and Francine was only a bitter taste of what they had been through. She glanced over at Tara who looked like she was reliving each tragedy as Sasha spoke them. Meanwhile, Olivia almost seemed embarrassed and Francine's attitude seemed to change slightly. She could see it in her body language.

"We're not excluding you guys." Sasha shook her head and pleaded with Olivia.

"You're treating us like the enemy." Francine stood with her arms crossed, unwilling to accept anything Sasha and Tara said even though she was standing over there probably wondering if she could have survived everything she just heard.

"I never saw you that way. I thought you were naive and unprepared, but never the enemy." If they were going to have this conversation it might as well be an honest one. "And I know Rick, Abraham, Michonne, Glenn...they all felt the same too."

"Maybe we weren't out there but we were in here surviving and making things better and creating a system that kept a lot of people alive for a long time. That's nothing to sneeze at and it's time you all respected that." Olivia was angry. She never saw her that way.

"You're right," Sasha said as she nodded her head and looked down. It felt like whatever she said was making them angrier instead of building a bridge, which is what she was trying to do.

"We're not better because of what we've been through. In many ways we're worse," Tara said as she walked over to Francine and Olivia. "And we're fortunate Aaron found us. You helped us when we needed it. We needed to see what life once was and could still be. We were in a bad way. Going down roads that we couldn't have come back from because we thought we had to be what this world was." Tara's voice was soft.

Tara's words gave them all pause. There was a difference between doing what needed to be done in this cruel world and behaving, feeling, and believing they had to be cruel. They could still be good people who would simply have to do some not-so-nice things from time to time to save their lives. They forgot that. She definitely forgot that. Since Bob's death at the hands of Gareth's group all she saw was cruelty and she was determined to fight fire with fire.

"I just feel like we may not know everything but it's not because we're stupid." Olivia walked over and handed Sasha a can of chickpeas. "It's the last can."

"I shouldn't." There may be an abundance of food, but there were still rules.

Olivia shook her head. "I'll deduct if from your next rations."

"Thanks." She loved roasting them with cayenne pepper. Abraham thought they were too spicy. He thought she made everything too spicy.

"If you don't mind me asking, what exactly happened that brought this out?" Tara asked. "If it's something I did or Sasha or anyone, the only way we'll do better is if we know what we're doing to offend you."

Sasha nodded and looked at Olivia and Francine.

"Well," Olivia started as she pushed her glasses up higher on her nose. "I'm not a thrill seeker and I've never been outside these walls, but Rosita telling me I'm not _allowed_ to go to The Hilltop like I'm a child and I have to do what she says really..."

"You biscuits are already burnt." Tara smiled.

Sasha shook her head and smiled as well. Leave it to Tara. At least she's not fist bumping everyone anymore. Sasha believed it to be a type of nervous tick that disappeared once she was comfortable around the group.

"Yeah, burns my biscuits."

"Why do you want to go to The Hilltop?" Sasha asked.

Even without knowing what went on between Rosita and Olivia, she was prone to side with Rosita. Olivia stepped up and killed walkers during the herd invasion, or as Eugene liked to call it, the Great Battle of Alexandria, but outside those walls posed an even greater threat — people.

"Not just The Hilltop. I want to go to all the communities. It can only help to see the different systems. If I can learn something from them to help make what I do better then that's a good thing. I don't need to write a list of questions so Rosita can get the answers. I know best what to ask. Most questions won't come up until I see their system and hear what they say."

Sasha and Tara looked at each other. It was obvious they both thought it made sense.

"Why don't I talk to Rick-"

"No," Olivia shook her head. "I'll talk to Rick."

Sasha caught what she did. At that moment she was no better than Rosita and it was another example of what pissed Olivia off. "Even better idea." She smiled. "We're far from perfect and we have a lot of stuff to work through, some of us more than others, but don't give up on us."

Olivia was smiling. Not Francine, but at least it wasn't a scowl. She liked Abraham and Carol, in due time maybe she'd give the rest of them a chance.


End file.
